Questions British Government on Ukraine Massacres

June 21, 1923

London (Jun. 21)

The Assistant Foreign Minister McNeil was asked in the House of Commons this morning by Noel Buxton whether Sir Halford Mackinder, acting as British High Commissioner of the Military Mission in South Russia, made a report on the wholesale persecutions of the Jews there during the time. Mr. McNeil replied that owing to the military situation then existing in the Ukraine, it was impossible for MacKinder to furnish any such report.

“How was it,” continued Buxton, “that no reports were made when it was known that Jews were being massacred, that many of them were drowned in the Dneister?”

“A great many reports to that effect were received, some reliable, some not,” McNeil said, “but the reports were not sufficiently accurate and Mackinder was unable, as previously said, owing to the military situation to furnish any reports.”